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Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

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Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#841

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

pxue wrote: post #381
nostromo wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Working in person isn't the issue here -- not having friends is the issue. People do make friends at work, and that's a good thing. But it should never be your primary place of making friends. (Friends and family won't lay you off like a job might. Having a network outside of work is critical if that ever happens.) Asking your coworkers to come into the office just so you can get some needed face time with other peop…

C'mon that's just bullshit. Once working, you spend 8h a day with a group of people. It's by far the easiest way to make friends since the needed repetition of making contact (a minimum requirement for friendship) is already solved by going to work together. Making friends as an adult is hard. Work is the easiest shortcut in establishing meaningful relationships with strangers. Edit: addressing some of the comments b…

I believe this comment and similar ones are evidence of how deeply society has been fucked over by sociopathic workaholics.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#842

Post by joxel »

0xB31B1B wrote: post #704
thebigfilter wrote: post #664

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a very effective playbook, but it’s taking the easy path. More interesting and challenging is building a high perf company that has a better relationship with it’s labor. A cutthroat model will always work, but I think humans are intelligent enough to build high performing groups that succeed while taking care of others. Even the mafia took care of family, in their own perverse way (If you off Tony for talking t…

This is exactly wrong. The people you want to take care of are the top 25% of your team. When you let someone go, it’s often because someone in the top 25% is complaining that they do not trust the low performer and the low performer increases the workload of the high performer. When you have a team of high performers, new high performing candidates recognize that and see that as a huge plus for recruitment. No great…

For some reason coming back to this thread, its really wild how sociopathic c-suite types have to be.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#843

Post by nunez »

0xB31B1B wrote: post #21

I’m a CTO at a small startup, not forcing RTO on anyone BUT the vibe I get in my peer group is that managers don’t know how to manage remote teams, don’t want to do real performance management, and they personally have some loneliness issues they solve by working from the office. I work from an office with my cofounder 1 day/week, and it has been great for my mental health to leave my living room. I think broadly spe…

See this is the thing that really confuses me about this whole kerfuffle.

The more we collectively push for remote work, the more likely it becomes that our compensation takes a huge nosedive. Engineers in Brazil or El Salvador will LOVE working at even 30% of total FAANG comp (while enjoying fewer worker's rights and fewer benefits), and they are by and large technically competent.

This whole thread has a very "I got mine" vibe to it.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#844

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

givemeethekeys wrote: post #488
pxue wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

C'mon that's just bullshit. Once working, you spend 8h a day with a group of people. It's by far the easiest way to make friends since the needed repetition of making contact (a minimum requirement for friendship) is already solved by going to work together. Making friends as an adult is hard. Work is the easiest shortcut in establishing meaningful relationships with strangers. Edit: addressing some of the comments b…

> Making friends as an adult is hard. Pick a social hobby. Pick up sports, hiking / running / reading / trivia / sports groups. Take a class. Take up a cause - volunteer your time at the local farm, shelter, political office.. Kids don't go to school with the goal of making friends. The friends are a byproduct.

I have done all of these things and cannot recall making a friend from any of them.

Perhaps my definition of "friend" is stricter than others. I differentiate between friends and acquaintances and a lot of people don't seem to.

But I think the more obvious answer is just that some people, like me, have a lot of difficulty connecting to other people. No amount of going to a gym will help that.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#845

Post by giraffe_lady »

Cub3 wrote: post #450

I've worked remote for several years as both a senior engineer and team leader, these are the problems with remote work I haven't yet found good solutions for: 1. I don't know how my employees are doing; many times in my career I've had to tell programmers to "go for a walk" or "time to go home" when they get stuck on a frustrating task or fall in to a flow state far past leaving time. Solutions I've found to this pu…

For #2 what you need is just budget $500 to get everyone a podcaster mic and a pair of open-back headphones for calls. It gets rid of the "half duplex" thing, and with the headphones plugged into the mic as a monitor you hear your voice in a different way and don't speak so loudly reducing fatigue a lot.

For #3 I just recommend pair programming. Pairing is already a skill that needs to be learned and remote pairing is a more difficult one. But the tools for it are better than they were a few years ago and are good enough, and it's an excellent venue for naturally exchanging a lot of that sideways knowledge and mindset that makes more experienced engineers so effective.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#846

Post by adamhp »

nunez wrote: post #835

Solving the in-person/remote work problem is becoming intractable. The people who prefer remote seem to strongly prefer remote. Any arguments against it are dismissed as RTO bootlicking. See the top-level comments here from people who will absolutely not give up remote work and are giving people advice on how to live in a remote-only world. (Just get a hobby, bro! How hard could it be? Can't make friends after work?…

I think there will just be a delineation in companies and what they offer in the same way that people used to flock to the big tech companies for all the "perks". Remote will be a "perk", and people who care deeply about remote work will flock to those companies and those companies will benefit. The people and companies who prefer RTO, will do so. It will just be another factor in the labor market.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#847

Post by softwaredoug »

65 wrote: post #342

I'm in my 20s. I live alone in a city where I don't know anyone. Remote work destroyed my mental health. All I wanted was to be able to go into an office and talk to a real life person. I would go weeks at a time not talking to a single person in real life. I don't think people understand the plight of the young office worker until they've experienced the torture of solitary confinement. Day in, day out. All alone. I…

From the employers PoV imagine a world where you have an influx of junior employees and interns. They need a higher level of structure and need the social outlet of work. If you're trying to build up this talent, it seems easier to do in the structure of an office. Imagine a junior employee even potentially moving somewhere for a job?

Currently, the economy is not aggressively hiring at the junior level. But this could change. What does that world look like when junior employees go into a fully isolated and remote setup? Either we need a structured central place for supporting those employees or society needs to solve these social and economic problems in a completely different way.

Remote work is easier for senior employees with families or a more established life. I think many here probably fit into this category. After even 4-5 years of life in an office, you probably lose the need to regularly see employees. But being junior / early on, it's a VERY tough road to be fully remote.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#848

Post by nunez »

benjaminwootton wrote: post #14

I think that in our field people work better together - more collaboration, knowledge transfer, teamwork and ultimately better solutions delivered. I also believe that people are more motivated and engaged, and work harder and with more focus in a shared workspace outside of the home. I was on the fence going into the remote work experiment, but everything I’ve seen since supports my feelings above. I’ve seen less of…

can confirm!

the culture at the company you co-founded and i worked for would have absolutely 1000% not existed if we were 100% remote.

we did amazing things, and i believe a lot of it was due to us being able to work together in person.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#849

Post by nunez »

thenoblesunfish wrote: post #502

I wonder if there is a bias towards WFH on HN because the type of person most likely to like WFH is also the kind to post a lot on internet message threads. I think most people feel most productive spending at least some time in the office with other people, face to face. Further, I assume many people are like me and feel like some pressure to actually go to the office is good, or I'd too often make the short term ea…

that's a really, really interesting take.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#850

Post by nunez »

adamhp wrote: post #846
nunez wrote: post #835

Solving the in-person/remote work problem is becoming intractable. The people who prefer remote seem to strongly prefer remote. Any arguments against it are dismissed as RTO bootlicking. See the top-level comments here from people who will absolutely not give up remote work and are giving people advice on how to live in a remote-only world. (Just get a hobby, bro! How hard could it be? Can't make friends after work?…

I think there will just be a delineation in companies and what they offer in the same way that people used to flock to the big tech companies for all the "perks". Remote will be a "perk", and people who care deeply about remote work will flock to those companies and those companies will benefit. The people and companies who prefer RTO, will do so. It will just be another factor in the labor market.

Agree. I can see big companies touting one/two WFH days or a 32-hour work-week as benefits.
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